RADFORD, VA—Leah Young's two-run home run in the top of the ninth led the Eagles to a 7-5 victory over Radford in the nightcap to earn a split in a doubleheader, Saturday afternoon. Winthrop dropped the first game of the day 5-1.

The Eagles are now 20-23 on the year and 9-9 in the Big South while Radford is 11-26 overall and 6-10 in the league. The rubber match will be on Sunday at 1 p.m.

In addition to Young's home run in the ninth, senior Sutton Watson tossed five innings of relief allowing just two hits with no walks and six strikeouts to improve to 5-6 on the year.

Trailing 5-3 in the top of the seventh inning, the Eagles rallied to force extra innings as Kelsey Ritter provided an RBI double to make it a one-run game followed by an RBI single from Haley Zuehlke two batters later to that tied the game at 5-5.

"Watson threw the best she's thrown in a while," said Winthrop head coach Mark Cooke. "We had some lack of timely hitting in the first game and timely hitting in the second game. Good to regroup and come back to get the second one."

Watson tossed nine innings on the day allowing two runs on five hits with no walks and eight strikeouts. Dallas King started the second game and threw four innings allowing five runs (three earned) on seven hits but did not factor in the decision.

Winthrop led 2-0 after the first thanks to a two-run home run by Ritter, her eighth of the season and 21^st of her career. The Eagles added to the lead in the third when K.J. Uyeno scored on a fielding error for a 3-0 lead.

A three-run third tied the game for Radford as Whitney Davis provided a two-run single and Megan Honaker scored the game-tying run on a fielder's choice by Casey Burns. Davis put Radford up 4-3 in the fifth with an RBI fielder's choice that was followed with an RBI double by Burns.

Kelsey Weddle, who got the win in the opening game of the doubleheader, took the loss in relief as she allowed two runs on one hit with and is now 3-9 on the year.

In the first game, Winthrop got on the scoreboard first in the top of the third thanks to a Maddie Antone sacrifice fly. Zharne Glover reached on an error to lead off the inning, stole second and then moved to third on a groundout by Paige Haley. After Uyeno walked to put runners at the corners, Antone hit a fly ball deep enough to center to allow Glover to score.

The lead was short lived as Radford posted three runs in the bottom of the third behind an RBI single from Davis to tie the game and then a two-run single by Kayla Bishton. Those were all the runs the Highlanders needed but they added two more in the fourth on a two-run home run by Davis.

Just two days after allowing five runs (four earned) on two hits with three walks in 0.1 innings, Weddle bounced back as she allowed the Eagles just one unearned run on one hit with three walks and five strikeouts to earn the win in the circle.

Sara Allen suffered the loss for the Eagles after allowing three runs on three hits with three walks and two strikeouts in two innings to fall to 10-8. Sutton Watson tossed four innings of relief allowing two runs on three hits with two strikeouts.

Antone, Zuehlke, Young and Ritter all had two hits on the day while Uyeno extended her streak of reaching base to nine games.